Returned Salvadoran migrant Kilmar Abrego Garcia arraigned on federal human trafficking charges in Tennessee

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15 hours ago

Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadorian migrant who was erroneously deported to El Salvador before being returned to the U.S. to face federal prosecution last week, pleaded not guilty on Friday to charges of human trafficking and conspiracy charges.
Garcia's legal team told U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes on Friday that they have had time to review the indictment, and Garcia understands what he is accused of, before he formally entered the plea, which stems from a 2022 traffic stop.
Abrego Garcia is charged with the trafficking of undocumented migrants, and conspiring with others to do so.
The criminal case against Abrego Garcia, an alleged MS-13 member, comes after a high-profile, protracted legal fight over his deportation and the Trump administration's efforts to delay his return to the U.S., even after the Supreme Court ordered the administration to "facilitate" his release earlier this year.
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The indictment alleges that Abrego Garica was part of a smuggling ring that helped bring immigrants to the U.S. illegally and smuggle them across the country. According to the indictment, Abrego Garcia and his co-conspirators made at least 100 trips between Texas and Maryland between 2016 and 2025, when he was deported.
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Special Agent Peter T. Joseph told prosecutors on Friday that he was first assigned to Abrego Garcia's case in April 2025, when he was still detained in El Salvador.
Since then, Joseph said, he has reviewed footage from Abrego Garcia's 2022 traffic stop, which has emerged as the basis of the human smuggling charges.
At the time, Joseph told prosecutors, Abrego Garcia had been driving a vehicle with nine passengers and was pulled over while driving from St. Louis to Maryland with an expired license.
Six of the nine passengers in the vehicle have since been identified as being in the U.S. illegally, Joseph said, adding that one passenger in the van told officers that he was born in 2007, which would have made him just 15 at the time.
Abrego Garcia's legal team has vehemently disputed his alleged status as an MS-13 member, and are expected to contest the effort by U.S. prosecutors to have him detained pending trial.
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His case has become a national flashpoint in the broader fight over Trump's hard-line immigration policies in his second White House term.
In a court filing Wednesday night, lawyers for Abrego Garcia urged U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes in Tennessee to release their client from custody while awaiting trial, arguing that the government's grounds for a detention hearing – and his alleged status as an MS-13 gang member – are meritless.
"Mr. Abrego Garcia asks the Court for what he has been denied the past several months – due process," his lawyers said, adding that there is no evidence their client is a flight risk, or that he has "systematically engaged in international travel in the recent past."
Abrego Garcia's attorneys have also disputed his status as a member of MS-13, which was based on allegations made by a confidential informant, according to court documents. The informant had alleged Abrego Garcia belonged to an MS-13 chapter in New York, where he had never lived.
Speaking at a press conference in Nashville before the arraignment, Abrego Garcia's wife, Jennifer Vasquez Sura, told reporters that yesterday marked three months since her husband was "abducted and disappeared" by the Trump administration.
She said the two were able to speak for the first time on Thursday.
"Kilmar wants you to have faith," Sura said. "He says to continue fighting, and I will be victorious because God is with us.'"
Sura noted that their son, Kilmar Jr., was currently attending his kindergarten graduation ceremony in Maryland. "My heart is in Maryland with my kids," she said, her voice breaking with emotion. "But I'm here fighting for my husband, for his dad to come back home."
Federal prosecutors disputed that and have urged the judge to keep him in custody, saying in a filing of their own that Abrego Garcia "would have enormous reason to flee" if he were not immediately detained by ICE.
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Court documents show the Justice Department filed the charges against Abrego Garcia on May 21 – prompting a flurry of questions as to when the investigation and impaneling of a grand jury would have taken place.
Abrego Garcia's arraignment in Tennessee comes after his legal team asked a federal judge in Maryland late Wednesday to impose sanctions on the Trump administration for the administration's "egregious" and "repeated violations" of discovery obligations, according to the filing.
"The Government's defiance has not been subtle," his attorneys told U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis, who had been presiding over a civil case to determine whether the Trump administration complied with her order to "facilitate" Abrego Garcia's return from El Salvador. "It has been vocal and sustained and flagrant."
In the filing, Abrego Garica's legal team asked Xinis to impose fines based on a finding of civil contempt, and to compel the government to compel the production of information that they say the administration has improperly withheld, as well as "investigate the extent of the government's willful noncompliance."
Xinis has yet to rule on the motion.
Earlier this week, lawyers for the Trump administration told the court that they planned to file a motion to dismiss the case by Monday on "mootness grounds," since Abrego Garcia is now on U.S. soil.
"The lengths the government has gone to resist discovery relating to these core questions raises a strong inference that the government is trying to hide its conduct from the scrutiny of this court, the plaintiffs, and the public," Abrego Garcia's team told Xinis on Wednesday.
"What the government improperly seeks to hide must be exposed for all to see."
Abrego Garcia's family sued the Trump administration in March after the Salvadoran man, who entered the country illegally around 2012 and was living in Maryland, was abruptly deported to El Salvador in March. An immigration judge ruled in 2019 that he could be deported, just not to El Salvador.
Upon being returned to the U.S. last week, Abrego Garcia was immediately sent to Tennessee to face federal charges related to transporting undocumented immigrants.
This is a developing news story. Check back for updates.Original article source: Returned Salvadoran migrant Kilmar Abrego Garcia arraigned on federal human trafficking charges in Tennessee